The Big Bad Wolf

LIZZIE CONNOLLY COULDN'T BELIEVE any of this awfulness was happening to her. It still didn't seem possible. It wasn't possible. And yet, here she was. A hostage! The house where she was being kept was full of people. Full! It sounded as if a party was going on. A party? How dare he? Was her insane captor that sure of himself? Was he so arrogant? So brazen? Was it possible? Of course it was. He'd boasted to her that he was a gangster, the king of gangsters, perhaps the greatest that ever lived. He had repulsive tattoos - on the back of his right hand, his shoulders, his back, around his right index finger, and also on his private parts, on his testicles and penis. Lizzie could definitely hear a party going on in the house. She could even make out conversations: small talk about an upcoming trip to Aspen; a rumored affair between a nanny and a local mother; the death of a child in a pool, a six-yearold like her Gwynne; football stories; a joke about two altar boys and a Siamese cat that she had already heard in Atlanta. Who the hell were these people? Where was she being held? Where am I, damn it? Lizzie was trying so hard not to go crazy, but it was almost impossible. All of these people, their inane talk. They were so close to where she was bound and tied and gagged and being held hostage by a madman, probably a killer. As Lizzie listened, tears finally began to run down her cheeks. Their voices, their closeness, their laughing, all just a few feet away from her. I'm here! I'm right here! Damn it, help me. Please help me. I'm right here! She was in darkness. Couldn't see a thing. The people, the party, were on the other side of a thick wooden door. She was locked in a small room that was part closet; she'd been kept in here for days. Permitted bathroom breaks but not much else. Bound tightly by rope. Gagged with tape. So she couldn't call out for help. Lizzie couldn't scream - except inside her head. Please help me. Somebody, please! I'm here! I'm right here! I don't want to die. Because that was the one thing he'd told her that was certain - he was going to kill her.

BUT NO ONE COULD HEAR Lizzie Connolly. The party went on and got larger, noisier, more extravagant, vulgar. Eleven times during the night, stretch limousines dropped off well-heeled guests at the large waterfront house in Fort Lauderdale. Then the limos left. They would not be waiting for their passengers. No one noticed, at least no one let on. And no one paid any attention when these same guests left that night in cars they hadn't arrived in. Very expensive cars, the finest in the world, all of them stolen. An NFL running back departed in a deep maroon Rolls- Royce Corniche convertible worth $363,000, "made to order," from the paint to the wood, hide, trim, even the position of the intercrossed Rs in the cockpit. A white rap star drove off in an aqua blue Aston Martin Vanquish priced at $228,000, capable of zero to a hundred in under ten seconds. The most expensive of the cars was the American-made Saleen S7, with its gull-wing doors, the look of a shark, and 550 horsepower. All in all, eleven very expensive, very stolen automobiles were delivered to buyers at the house. A silver Pagani Zonda priced at $370,000. The engine of the Italian-made racer barked, howled, roared. A silver and orange-trimmed Spyker C8 Double 12 with 620 horsepower. A bronze Bentley Azure Mulliner convertible - yours for $376,000. A Ferrari 575 Maranello - $215,000. A Porsche GT2. Two Lamborghini Murcielagos-yellow gold-$270,000 apiece, named, like all Lamborghinis, after a famous bull. A Hummer H1 - not as hot as the other cars, maybe, but nothing got in its way. The total value of the stolen cars was over three million; the sales came to a little under two. Which more than paid for the Sacher tortes flown all the way from Vienna. And besides, the Wolf was a fan of fast, beautiful cars... of fast, beautiful everything.